Aldeburgh v Harwich 2

28th September – Queen’s Field

Result: Aldeburgh 64 Harwich 19

Rugby is back at the Queen’s Field

The sun shone, a goodly crowd of spectators turned up and there were enough players to stage a match which turned into a feast of running rugby.  It was great to be back.

As a result of the pre-match negotiations, Aldeburgh’s eleven players faced twelve from Harwich.  Scrums were to be uncontested.  They had a few big lads.  The pitch was hard.  There would be a lot of running to do in which the one man advantage could be significant.

The first ten minutes bore out the initial concerns.  Harwich ran the ball well.  Aldeburgh gave away a series of penalties, mainly for high tackles, and could not get out of their own 22, despite a raking clearance kick by fly half Ed Robson.  The pressure eventually told with Harwich getting a try under the posts which was converted.

From the restart, the flow of the match changed.  Aldeburgh were awarded their first penalty around half way.  They ran the ball to the left wing then brought it back across the pitch to scrum half, Fred Precious, who jinked through to go over for the first try.

Fred made another tremendous run as Aldeburgh began to take the initiative.  It remained well-balanced until 25 minutes in when from a scrum Aldeburgh again moved the ball out to the wing then back inside, this time to Ed Robson who touched down before converting his own try from the touchline.  A few minutes later, Ed scored again.  This time it was from clean line out ball, good movement in the backs and a first phase try.  Ed made sure to get round under the posts to give himself an easy conversion. 

By the half hour mark, with Aldeburgh leading 19-7, it became clear that, while Harwich had a numerical advantage, they were not as fit or as mobile.  The nine core players in the Aldeburgh team were those who regularly attended training and it showed.  Coach, Paddy Allen, has been drumming into them for years the importance of communication.  We could hear from the touchline that it was working.  Here was a group of players who in attack were alive to the opportunities and were sharing them and in defence were alert to the threats and combining well to snuff them out.

The pattern was set.  Aldeburgh’s running created opportunities.  Their tackling stopped Harwich from creating anything.  Ed Robson was influential throughout, as always.  He scored the next try, nearly went over again but was tackled just short of the line.  From the ensuing ruck, the ball went right and Fred Precious side-stepped his way over for his second. 

In the last move before half-time, a poor clearance kick landed directly in the midriff of Tom Harrison who reacted first by running hard before the Harwich players could retreat from their offside positions.  One managed to try to tackle Tom but bounced off him before he went over in the corner.  Having played a couple of times last season, we are hoping that he will become a regular on the wing or in the centre.

With a 38-7 half time lead, Aldeburgh had the confidence to run hard at Harwich throughout the second half.  The forwards joined in with powerful runs by Jon Hunt, Toby Mann and captain Freddie Burgess, happily restored to the team after missing most of last season with an Achilles injury.  The next try came from a huge dummy from Sam Mann which opened a gap for him to stroll through and touch down under the posts. 

Nothing was going right for Harwich.  Even their line out was failing to function.  A throw went right over the top.  Fred Precious was first to react, caught the ball, passed to Tom Harrison who ran through the Harwich defence to score.

Fifty minutes after their first try, Harwich managed another.  A super little pass put them through, a long kick and hack on took them over the line.  The conversion bounced back off the cross bar.

There were groans from Aldeburgh players and supporters alike when Freddie Burgess kicked from hand (again).  But when he chased it, hacked on and was racing for the line, the groans turned to cheers.  Sadly, he ended up on top of the last opponent rather than on the ball, giving away a penalty.  He emerged still smiling as was everybody on the touchline.

A newly recruited winger produced a delightful swerve to go past his man to score the next try.  Finally, Fred Precious got another when Ed ran a dummy line to the blind side of a scrum to enable Fred to go open and score. 

Credit to Harwich that they got the final try when their big No 19 finally used his weight to bludgeon his way over the line.

Ten tries and seven conversions gave Aldeburgh a convincing win in the first match of the season.  Having already lost five points because Colchester were unwilling to rearrange a fixture on the first Saturday of the season, this bonus point win takes Aldeburgh back to mid-table with zero points.  A great start to the playing season.

Touch Rugby

Colchester 4 v Aldeburgh

13th April – Colchester

Result: Colchester 17 Aldeburgh 41

End of season friendly in the sunshine

With only five players available so far for the Harwich match next week, there was every likelihood that this would be Aldeburgh’s last game of the season.  No result could alter the final league standings of either team.  What was in effect an old fashioned ‘friendly’ in the sunshine was nevertheless played with whole hearted commitment by both teams.

As so often recently, Aldeburgh fielded a team of core regulars supplemented by a variety of recently acquired helpers.  For the first 15 minutes, the well-established Colchester team looked as though they would wreak havoc on the Aldeburgh assemblage.  Their number 12 looked particularly dangerous.  Determined tackling enabled Aldeburgh to prevent a score despite showing every sign of having been introduced to each other just before the kick off.

And then after 15 minutes, the Colchester backs dropped the ball, Fred Precious, on the wing this week, picked up, hacked on, passed to Ben Watts who linked with Jed Gallant who still had a lot to do to make the line for the first try.  Lewis Wardell Bird, playing prop, converted.  It began to look as though 15 minutes was enough practice together for the Aldeburgh team to start playing coherently.

A few minutes later, Fred collected a deep Colchester clearing kick, flicked it inside to Adam Hateley, the other winger, who ran, passed back to Fred for him to set off on a cross field run before linking with prop Aaron Tuck who powered over. 

From then on the game was characterised by powerful runs by Aldeburgh, David Rix at flanker was outstanding in this regard.  The other flanker, Toby Mann, joined in.  Toby even passed the ball occasionally.  An unusual line up featured Jon Hunt, usually a flanker or second row, at fly half.  In previous reports, I have credited Jon with ‘outrageous’ dummies.  To describe the string of dummies he sold in this game, I need recourse to the thesaurus.  I’m tempted by ‘of the first water, vintage, classic, exquisite.’ Take your pick.  Paddy Allen was heard to comment that one could almost see Jon writing the email to tell the opposition that a dummy was coming but when he hit the Send button they still bought it.  His first took him on a run from half way to score the final try of the first half to give Aldeburgh a lead of 27-0.

For inexplicable reasons, Aldeburgh played with their shirts reversed to show their alternative colours at the beginning of the second half.  They shipped two tries before changing back to their regular strip.  A coincidence?  I don’t think so.

Aldeburgh scored a couple more tries to one by Colchester in the second half.  Jon Hunt continued to throw dummies.  Ben Watts, David Rix and Fred Precious made several strong runs, Adam Hateley scythed down anyone who came near him.  Both teams gave it their all despite the warm conditions and hard pitch.  Sadly, the final moment of the game saw David Rix lying prone with a dislocated shoulder.  We wish him a speedy recovery.

Colchester is a huge club with superb facilities which maintains a good spirit throughout.  Their fourth team always provide a competitive match played hard and fair even when losing.